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Re: [tor-talk] evidence that Tor isn't "amoral"?



1) Several people misunderstood a study finding that 80% of onion
service was child pornography and flipped it to being 80% Tor traffic.
It was parroted by government officials, and then became 'truth' by
virtue of people blindly following government fiat. From what I
remember, onion service traffic represents about 1.5% of Tor traffic.

Here is Wired explaining how the Justice Department failed so miserably.
http://www.wired.com/2015/01/department-justice-80-percent-tor-traffic-child-porn/

2) What is 'amoral'?
This is a legal and philosophical question. Is it amoral to the
government? To religion? To liberals? To homophobes? Or to you/your
friend/family/acquaintance/some dude on an irc chat?

Yes, Tor is often used for what some would consider amoral. Talking
negatively about your government can get you disappeared. Being
homosexual in Uganda can get you killed. Being a political activist in
your country could get you a bullet in your head, or in Brazil you could
be... Nevermind.

In countless countries around the world governments decide what can and
cannot be done, said, or thought. Tor allows people to be who they
are/want to be, without worrying about everyone and everything.

Watching pornography is most definitely amoral in some countries, but
not in others. Whose morality defines morality?

It's also incredibly difficult to correlate Tor 'amorality' against
clearnet 'amorality'. Amorality is in the eye of the accuser.


My advice: don't listen to your online friend, he doesn't know what he's
talking about. The only way to know exit-relay traffic stats is to pwn
every exit relay and capture all data over a long period of time to
analyze where everyone goes - which is not a realistic possibility. Or
tell your friend to get off their high horse of moral superiority and
realize that someone somewhere thinks what everyone else does is amoral,
and they have the right to think what they do just like everyone else -
just like I have the right to think they are total douche bags.


Matt
Speak Freely

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